KYIV — Standing in front of a row of scorched buildings where dozens of people were killed, António Guterres, the U.N. secretary general, called the war in Ukraine “an absurdity” and said: “There is no way a war can be acceptable in the 21st century.”
Mr. Guterres visited Ukraine days after meeting President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia in Moscow. His goals included securing evacuation routes for besieged civilians and supporting the prosecution of war crimes.
After arriving on Wednesday night, he said: “The sooner this war ends, the better — for the sake of Ukraine, Russia and the world.”On Thursday morning, Mr. Guterres toured the stunning wreckage in Borodianka, Bucha and Irpin, three suburbs of Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, that have borne the heavy cost of war.
In Borodianka, he gazed up at towering apartment blocks pounded by bombs that left them empty, charred and barely standing.
“I imagine my family in one of those houses that is now destroyed and black,” he said. “I see my granddaughters running away in panic.”
In Bucha — the site of some of the most disturbing atrocities, where hundreds of dead civilians were found this month after Russian troops pulled out — he urged Russia to cooperate with the International Criminal Court’s investigations into possible war crimes.
“I fully support the I.C.C. and I appeal to the Russian Federation to accept, to cooperate with the I.C.C.,” he said. “But when we talk about war crimes, we cannot forget that the worst of crimes is war itself.”
He toured Bucha’s shrapnel-pocked church, flanked by a priest and Ukrainian military officials. He also peered into a large pit in front of the church that during the Russian occupation had served as a communal grave.
The bodies inside have been exhumed and are being forensically examined, as Ukrainian and international experts try to build a war crimes case.
As he passed the site with his entourage, one stray black shoe lay at the edge of the grave.
Later in the day, Mr. Guterres was scheduled to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. Weeks ago, Mr. Zelensky openly questioned the value of the United Nations, using a speech to the U.N. Security Council to say that the world body “simply cannot work effectively” if it could not stop the aggression by Russia, a permanent member of the council.
